TWIST THE KNIFE and make it better
by charmingsyrai
Summary: S3!Ruby/Dean. Prompt: "You could be empty, and I can be right here empty with you"  written for The Non-Canon Couple Ficathon! @ LJ


**Supernatural** | S3!Ruby/Dean | PG-13 | _You could be empty, and I can be right here empty with you_ written for The Non-Canon Couple Ficathon!

1. Considering the fact I haven't really written -or felt like writing- anything like this for a few years now, I really must thank **ninkasa** for the awesome prompt! Though this may not be what she was looking for, it still got my creative juices flowing and for that I am grateful :D I feel like I'm just getting started again, yay!  
>2. This thing has not been beta-read so if you see any horrific errors, please point them out! You know how it is when you reread your own stuff again and again to the point you can't really even see the words anymore, plus, spell-check only gets you so far. Thanks!<p>

**TWIST THE KNIFE (and make it better)**

The air is heavy but not because of the climate, no (though it has been promising rain), and Dean Winchester is pretty sure he'll run out of oxygen any minute now. It's the kind of pressure that immobilizes both the mind and body and you can't fight it with cold showers or expensive alcohol. He's tried, a few times already actually and it just. Does. Not. Work.

Ever since Vermont, every town, every hunt - the same pressure. The molecules around him, all heavy with something almost deadly; with lost dreams and failed missions and memories of those who they, despite the many efforts, couldn't save. Who _he_ couldn't protect.

You can't wash that away with icy water or burning whiskey, no matter how much you'd want to.

The molecules are screaming murder, not letting him forget, and it's the one name and the only face he can't even bear to think about. Even after death, the bitch still tries and drains him (the air, must be her fault), like she did straight from the beginning.

It's kind of funny, the way Dean can soldier through a lot of issues that would cruelly crush most people, the way he can hide a lot of his own thoughts behind a mask of indifference. But the funniest thing of all, he concludes, is probably the fact he's always telling Sam how _you can't save everyone, that's just life_ and yet this time, it's not Sam who's in need of assurance.

This one loss, it carves a big fat piece and does it solely from Dean's soul.

_Well, fuck it._ He figures, with a snort, that it's probably for the best anyway, a carved soul is a smaller soul and perhaps it won't hurt so bad when it finally reaches the pit. Nothing left for those sons of bitches to torture or whatever. To him, it seems as logical as it doesn't.

Dean's sitting on some motel's (he can't remember which one or where) lumpy sofa, with a bottle of whiskey in one hand and an empty glass in the other and like on so many nights before during this week, he can't really decide whether to pour a refill or not.

There's that little hint of a guardian angel, of a big brother, sitting on his shoulder, saying _you shouldn't, Sam might need backup, get your head in the game_ whereas on the other, there's something darker, going, _why bother, you're going to hell in a week or so, might as well enjoy while you can and-_

"Really?" a voice suddenly starts from behind his shoulders, pausing his thoughts and freezing him solid (even though he'd recognize that voice anywhere, anytime, so it doesn't actually startle him the way another voice would), "Don't tell me you made Sam go all alone hunting while you stayed behind only to dwell on self-pity?"

It takes a second longer than it usually does for him to compose himself, for him to draw in that infamous smirk of his and over the couch's back, he quips, "well hey, what can I say? It's not always Sam's turn to dwell."

Ruby snorts, she's damned good at that, and walks around the couch with arms folded into about a million accusations. "I knew you can be pathetic, but _this_, honestly?" She nods towards him, eyes full of loathing as well as something else, something softer, only Dean can't label it, "Your time is almost up and you're wasting it on whiskey?"

He finds it ironic, somehow, and perhaps a little angering if he wasn't half wasted, that she sounds more like the guardian angel on his shoulder than the devil she should be. It's not right.

"Well, hookers would've been funnier, I know, but they can be so high maintenance, with the payment and all," Dean offers and Ruby, she's not accepting. Every fiber of her being is screaming frustration and it makes his smirk grow stronger, the glint in his eyes a little more alive.

"Go to hell, Dean," she barks, efficiently killing that _glint_ and then, with a malicious quirk of an eyebrow, giggles all catty, "right, I forgot for a second."

He hates how familiar it feels, that kind of snark and how it makes him respond. Sometimes, when he's too far gone to stop himself from going with _what ifs_, like now, he finds himself wondering what it would be like if only she wasn't a demon bitch, but an actual human being.

The moment he realizes where his head is at, once again, he asks, "What the fuck do you want?" because he's tired of this game of hate they're always playing. He's tired of hate, period, and darkness and all this shit.

The demon can easily sense this, everything that he doesn't word, but she's smart enough to make no comments. There's this certain vulnerability in his eyes, a weakness shadowing his whole frame and making him an easy target. Not just for her, but for every other creature in his tail and she can't have that.

Ruby knows only one way to quick mend this sort of wound.

Dean, he can see her posture softening all the sudden and just like that, _she's looking almost humane, woah._

The bells in the back of his mind are ringing, signaling a warning. _It's an act,_ they say, and he knows it, but right now, he doesn't really have it in him to care.

"I get it, what you're going though," she tells, _softly,_ and there's no hate left in her voice, "one minute you can't feel and the next you're feeling everything. The weight of the world. You're grieving for that Talbot girl, and not for the right reasons. You're lost and confused and you don't want to admit any of that because fuck it, you're the all mighty _Dean Winchester_, right?" She gives him this _look_, this one look that tells him there's nothing he can say to throw her off.

Without a warning, she moves closer, so close that he can smell her scent and he can't help but try breathing in. She bends slightly, only to remove the bottle and the glass from his hands and places them on the table in front of him. All the while she's doing this, he can't get his eyes off of hers.

Ruby likes it, the way he has to look up - for once.

"Sure, I get that," she continues, again, but this time her voice is stronger, carries more weight and he can hear the demon again, not the girl. "But it's no fucking excuse to whistle the game. You're going to Hell, Dean. Make it worth it."

Later, but not right now, Dean will ask himself what in the God's name possessed him to do it because the next minute, he can see his hand touching her waist, fingers curling around the hem of her t-shirt and slowly pulling it upwards. If he looked up, he'd see the satisfied grin playing on her lips, tugging the corners.

Her skin feels so soft, so warm, that it makes him forget everything he should remember.

The air is shifting, lighter - easier to breathe in and out, but he doesn't notice it yet.

Dean's not sure if it was him that pulled or her that pushed, but a second later she's there, on his lap and her fingers, her mouth, they're absolutely _everywhere._

The _woman_ murmurs something against his neck, but he can't make out the words, and he's not that interested, either. She'd only ruin it.

And then, he can't remember anything anymore, can't think, can't feel. _Empty._

She says, "I need you ready, fighting. I can't have you empty of emotion, unable to react in the middle of a battle." At that moment, he doesn't understand what the words mean, doesn't care a flying fuck because she feels too good and he's in a rush.

When Sam finally returns, an hour or so later, the first thing he says, wrinkling his forehead, is: "Something is changed" and then with a small laughter, "dude, you're practically glowing. Got that hooker then, hmm."

Dean, sitting on the couch with a remote controller in his hand, he _smiles_ and says, "Something like that, sure. But not quite."

-FIN.


End file.
